'Thou Ghost,' I said, 'and is thy name To-day?--
Yesterday's son, with such an abject brow!--
And can To-morrow be more pale than thou?'
While yet I spoke, the silence answered: 'Yea,
Henceforth our issue is all grieved and grey,
And each beforehand makes such poor avow
As of old leaves beneath the budding bough
Or night-drift that the sundawn shreds away.'
Then cried I: 'Mother of many malisons,
O Earth, receive me to thy dusty bed!'
But therewithal the tremulous silence said:
'Lo! Love yet bids thy lady greet thee once:--
Yea, twice,--whereby thy life is still the sun's;
And thrice,--whereby the shadow of death is dead.'